Changed media consumption challenges content creators
The “media consumption” of an average US citizen reached a whopping 10 hours and 24 minutes per day in the second quarter of 2018. This is the result of the “Nielsen Report” published by the renowned market research institute The Nielsen Company. Remarkably, the medium used by the far majority of users was one you wouldn’t expect: the radio. 92% of the respondents listen to the radio week by week — may it via the traditional broadcasting companies, via internet radio or via satellite.
The future is mobile
By far the strongest media consumers are in the group of 50 to 64-year-olds and they mainly watch TV and listen to the radio. For the 18 to 34-year-olds media means mostly digital media. Their device of choice is the smartphone. In other words, today the digital media consumption of the younger generations is mobile. This development was rapid. Just a few years ago, digital media — at least in the western world — were consumed primarily at the desktop computers. This trend will continue. It even will accelerate due to new technologies like 5G and the even more smartphone affine subsequent generations. This has consequences for the entire industry.
Obviously it makes a huge difference whether you want to get some quick information on what’s going in the world while commuting to office or having a quick lunch break or you do so, enjoying your news paper at Sunday’s breakfast table. While in the latter time is plenty and the mood is relaxed, in the first situation time is scarce and there are other things your mind as well.
15 seconds
As a result, of course, the reading behavior is completely different. Although the story of the enormously short attention span of the “homo digitalis” –
allegedly shorter than that of a goldfish — is more or less fake news, there is nevertheless a certain truth in it. Users of digital media decide much faster whether they really want to finish an article or watch a video completely than analog users. More than half of all Internet users “read” an article for just 15 seconds. Even more important: while a reader of a (printed) newspaper simply turns pages and turns to another article in the same(!) newspaper, the digital user often leaves the particular webpage completely and opens another one.
This fits in with the fact that social media has become the most important source of information, especially among 18 to 29-year-olds. According to a study by the PEW Research Center, 36% of this age group now receive news primarily through the social networks. Thus, messages are increasingly less consciously and actively sought, but “found” within a certain random frame. The earlier mentioned newspaper reader normally reads the newspaper in a fixed pattern, for example the sports section first, then economics and finances and finally perhaps the political department. Those who rely on social media see the latest news appearing on the screens of their smartphones as a result of their own user behavior and the one of their peer group.
In addition web articles are then often not even klicked on and opened, but only the headline was read.
Social fake news
Herein lie the main reasons for the enormous spread of “fake news” on the social media. In general you do trust your own circle of friends. The relatively short attention span users spend on reading particular news leads often to a faster distribution. In itself, little time is devoted to reflection and since “fake news” is strongly aiming at emotions, they are shared faster under exact this emotional impression. Even in the analog world of our times, the three sieves of Socrates are rarely used, but in the digital world they seem to have fallen completely into oblivion.
The result is a slightly schizophrenic situation. While for more and more users social media is a primary or even sole source of information, Facebook & Co. suffered a massive loss of trust at the same time last year. The data scandal around Cambridge Analytica is only the tip of the iceberg. Here is a small list of the problems and scandals faced by Facebook in the past year. Twitter has corresponding problems — keyword “bots”. The platforms are taking the topic quite seriously out of pure self-interest with regards to the preservation of their business model. In addition, politicians have long since discovered the issue and are further aggravating the problems of the platforms by a too radical reform of the EU copyright.
This challenges the content creators. They want to reach and gain readers by exciting, interesting and surprising articles and of course they want as many readers as possible to share these articles in the realm of social media. At the same time, nobody wants to see „additional information panels“ next to their posted articles or even being labeled “fake news”, just because certain minor aspects were mentioned only marginally. Not to mention a possible suspension for copyright infringement.
The blockchain solution
This is where crumbl comes in — a content marketplace system based on the distributed ledger technology (DLT). Thanks to DLT the authors as well as the distribution are always transparent and clearly traceable. Thus, content creators will participate in the generated advertising revenues in a fair and transparent way. But transparency is also good protection against fake news and copyright infringement. Because “fake news” are usually “created” under the protection of anonymity and copyright infringement occurs primarily when the respective authors feel safe from discovery. Thanks to DLT, the authors are always well-known. Due to the tracked distribution possible copyright infringements are easily recognized and can also easily be compensated.
Finally, content producers can significantly increase their reach by easily and conveniently providing their content to more than one platform or increasing their revenue by selling their works exclusively. And posting, managing and tracking content on social media becomes a no-brainer with crumbl.
Learn more about crumbl here. If you want to participate in crumbl, just send an email to Felix at felix@crumbl.org and you can convince yourself.
